What the heck is this??!!
 

It is bright red (quite pretty actually), and about an inch across. Never noticed it until a couple days ago, as it is partially hidden behind a rock in the back of my tank. I thought maybe a sponge, but it moves a bit with the water currents unlike some other sponges (not red) that I do have. Or some kind of macro algae?

http://i1304.photobucket.com/albums/...psed379d9e.jpg

I am guessing it is Peyssonnelia squamaria. Some type Chloroplast, so yes some algea. Its pretty cool looking, I remembers seeing the same thing at Wais.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chloroplast

Yeah, I guess that is possible. Doesn't quite match the shape and colour, but I haven't found any closer resemblance.

Its colourful though
I guess the tang doesn't eat it

That's a red macro algae known as Predaea with gelatinous thalli . I should have a frag last year send to me from a guy at Edmonton but the plant didn't survive due to cold weather & poor packing. If you don't want it, I'll love to purchase or trade from you.

No,... not yet. Yeah, it is really bright red. If it was a coral, would probably be worth a fortune...LOL.

Will see how it grows. Like I said, first saw it only a couple days ago. Hope it is not some bad pest, though, that will overrun my tank.

I googled that, and yes, that could be it. Except mine is much brighter red than the internet pics I saw.

So, are you telling me this is worth something?...LOL

I am going to let it grow out a bit, and see what it looks like. Keep in touch.

I look forward to that so that I can have a frag from you.

So, how do I frag something like that? Just slice off a piece? How do I stick it to a new rock?

You simply use a sharp blade to slice off a small pc. ( approx. 1/4 or 1/5 from the whole ) either glue directly to a rubble ( not always workable ) or to place it inside a small clear plastic container without cap together with a rubble inside for it to anchor naturally and to place the algae or holder to a position without strong flow and intense light. The new frag will take a week more or over a month to be noticeable any growth depends on enough of nutrients obtained from the existing water column. HTH

Can it survive any time out of water, for gluing or attachment to a rock?

It looks soooo Purrdy!

~Tony

Yeah, weird to say, but it is probably the purdiest live thing in my tank right now. Any red algae that I have ever seen is a dull orange/red. But this one is a deep bright red.

Maybe I could give it a designer algae name... LOL.

No problem at all.

The algae will change to a dull orange/red color when you fail to maintain the existing combination of trace element in your water column. A lot of red algae species like Halymenia sp. ( commonly known as flame algae ) has bright orange/red color too.

So, what type of conditions and trace elements do these red algae prefer? My tank recently went through a phosphate spike (when I combined sumps with another tank that had higher phosphates). But that is getting back to near zero now. My nitrates remain at zero (or undetectable). And I should add that it is an SPS dominant tank.

I have not added any live rock (just some dry marco rock), and the tank is about 13 years old. I have no idea where the live rock originally came from (we bought the house 3 1/2 years ago with the tank running).

So just wondering where this red algae came from? I have never seen it before.

I want I want! Apparently, macro algaes don't have a nice market over here in Canada :( When you have enough, would you please sell me some? Those thing don't need overnight shipping, just some water to keep it wet and regular shipping does the trick :D

Honestly speaking I've no idea although I experienced keeping quite a various types of marine plants long ago and I'm still running 2 small systems mainly for macro algae.

I've came across this algae twice and tried to keep it without success. The very 1st time was obtained from Rene/J&L long ago and that was my fault that the small frag was not properly glued to the LR and I never found it again among the forest of marine plants. The 2nd time was I didn't even have a chance to raise the small frag since the algae had turned into 80% transparent when I received because of poor shipping and cold weather.

I've encountered some of the macro algae die off and return alive after one whole year. Some unnoticeable small frags or sprouts of algae dormant for months and start growing all of a sudden. All these may be the reason why you have this algae or the new fish/coral or even a snail you newly purchased carried the spores and introduced into your system.

Well, for now it is a moot point, since my specimen is only about 1 inch across. Will see if it grows or not. And I owe ferret a frag first. I should mention though that I just saw rogair in Cgy post what looks likes the same red algae.

I should also mention that my recent phosphate spike brought out all types of algae in my tank, incl GHA, film algae, valonia and even a few of those long green weed type things. So, maybe it is all related. But my phosphates are subsiding, and I see the GHA starting to turn brown and letting go of their grip, so maybe this red algae might disappear, too.

Anyway, just another thing to keep this hobby interesting...

Don't worry for this algae seems hardy to me and I'm pretty sure that belongs to one of the slow growing species among the red macro algae.

But his is green and me likes red :biggrin:

I am pretty sure you won't have trouble growing it :D Weirdly, ornamental algae likes a bit cleaner water if I am not wrong. :D

I thought he had some red stuff in there, too, in one of the pics, unless that was just coralline on the rocks.